Yesterday’s church service was a message of hope and encouragement…..using excerpts from Psalm 139, our Pastor spoke eloquently about God knowing us intimately and before we were even a glimmer in someone’s eyes. My own brain and heart was filled with comfort, knowing that there was a plan for me all along and that I was “fearfully and wonderfully” made to do good things. Knowing that “everyday of my life was recorded in (His) book” was communicated in order for us to trust and have faith in that which we do not know.

However, for my trauma-filled WonderGIRL, today’s message brought out anger and deep-rooted abandonment fears. Did God know what was going to happen to her when He “knit her together?” And if He did know, why did He let that happen? Why did her Mom forget about her when Moms weren’t supposed to do that? And of course the fear of “will my Mom now forget how to love me and leave me too?” Her questions and tears filled our car on the way home from church. But then later they turned to vicious words and looks toward me over teeny tiny issues.

What I attributed as “teenage behavior”, my amazing husband saw as much more (which I appreciated once I got over my disappointment in being wrong). Identifying that her hard feelings in the morning were connected to her behavior toward me later brought about a huge sense of relief in her that I just had no idea was there. This took our parenting approach from the forcing of “respectful re-do’s” and safety plans to an approach to get out her angry thoughts and assure her that I would never leave. I asked her to pretend her biological mother was sitting with us and invited her to say anything she felt like saying as I typed a letter recording her words.

Here is a small excerpt of her letter:
Why did you even have me if you were just going to pass me off a million different times? What was the point of having two kids if you never paid attention to them? (WB) was little so he doesn’t understand.. All he knows is that me and (Dad’s girlfriend) were the only people that talked to him. I understood that you didn’t care but he didn’t. I understood that I wanted you to be part of my life but you never cared enough to show up or try.

You didn’t come to the court date. It’s like you didn’t want us. You thought “oh well it doesn’t work.” It’s always worth a try when it comes to family. I usually give up but I go back and try to figure it out. Like one time I went to the dentist and I was doing homework before that and when I came back, the homework was easier.

Also, I wish you realized what you had and then you lost it.

And then I got to hold her, re-assure her, and send her off to bed with the kind of comfort that is supposed to come from a mother. I share this story and this message because it documents the filter of a trauma-impacted brain and how we can sometimes think we are comforting or encouraging someone, when it is actually increasing their fear and doubts even further. WonderGIRL specifically is often told by well-intentIoned youth leaders to pray and forgive the people that have wronged her, which sometimes pushes her into further depression and confusion around her abuse. We are still navigating these triggers delicately and would love some sage guidance from any of you trauma-mamas out there on how to have these conversations……until then, we just take one day at a time with great love and even greater patience.